1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a medical image handling system and a medical image handling method for a medical X-ray image or the like.
2. Related Background Art
For an X-ray photographing for example for medical diagnosis, there is often utilized a film-screen system in which a sensitizing screen and an X-ray photographic film are combined.
In such system, X-rays transmitted by an object include internal information of the object, and are converted by the sensitizing screen into visible light proportional to the intensity of the X-rays. Then the thus-converted visible light exposes the X-ray photographic film to form an X-ray image thereon. In a medical facility utilizing such a system, the X-ray image is conventionally observed by placing the film on a light box.
On the other hand, there is recently being employed a digital X-ray image pickup apparatus capable of reading a radiation image as an electrical signal and executing a digital conversion of the read electrical signal to a digital image by various methods, such as a method of accumulating an X-ray intensity distribution as a latent image of energy in a stimulable phosphor and reading that image, a method of directly reading a fluorescence distribution of a fluorescent member formed by the X-rays, or a method of reading an image by a technology not utilizing the fluorescence distribution.
Also, because digital image pickup has become possible, digital image diagnosis by displaying the obtained image on a display screen of a computer instead of outputting such image on a film, is beginning to be used.
On the other hand, in the medical imaging field, there has recently been active investigation of computer aided diagnosis (CAD), which analyzes a simple X-ray image or a computerized tomography (CT) image by a computer to generate a CAD image (diagnosis assisting image) and detecting from such CAD image (diagnosis assisting image) a portion suspected for a disease, and which is expected to contribute to early detection of diseases.